In no country had superstition, scholasticism, hierarchy, and popery, been so powerful as among the Germanic nations. These simple and candid people had humbly bent their neck to the yoke that came from the banks of the Tiber. But, there was in them a depth, a life, a need of interior liberty, which, sanctified by the Word of God, might render them the most energetic organs of christian truth. It was from them that was destined to emanate the reaction against that material, external, and legal system, which had taken the place of Christianity; it was they who were called to shatter in pieces the skeleton which had been substituted for the spirit and the life, and restore to the heart of Christendom, ossified by the hierarchy, the generous beatings of which it had been deprived for so many ages. The Universal Church will never forget the debt it owes to the Princes of Spire and to Luther.
GERMANY AND REFORM.
VII. The protest of Spire had still further increased the indignation of the Papal adherents; and Charles the Fifth, according to the oath he had made at Barcelona, set about preparing "a suitable antidote for the pestilential disease with which the Germans were attacked, and to avenge in a striking manner the insult offered to Jesus Christ."[185] The Pope, on his part, endeavoured to combine all the other princes of Christendom in this crusade; and the peace of Cambray, concluded on the 5th August, tended to the accomplishment of his cruel designs. It left the Emperor's hands free against the heretics. After having entered their protest at Spire, it was necessary for the Evangelicals to think of maintaining it.
The Protestant states that had already laid the foundations of an evangelical alliance at Spire, had agreed to send deputies to Rothach; but the Elector, staggered by the representations of Luther, who was continually saying to him, "It is by keeping yourselves tranquil and in quietness that you will be saved,"[186] ordered his deputies to listen to the propositions of his allies, but to decide upon nothing. They adjourned to a new conference, which never took place. Luther triumphed; for human alliances failed. "Christ the Lord will know how to deliver us without the Landgrave, and even against the Landgrave," said he to his friends.[187]
DIFFICULTY OF UNION.
Philip of Hesse, who was vexed at Luther's obstinacy, was convinced that it arose from a dispute about words. "They will hear no mention of alliances because of the Zwinglians," said he; "well then, let us put an end to the contradictions that separate them from Luther."
The union of all the disciples of the Word of God seemed in fact a necessary condition to the success of the Reform. How could the Protestants resist the power of Rome and of the Empire, if they were divided? The Landgrave no doubt wished to unite their minds, that he might afterwards be able to unite their arms; but the cause of Christ was not to triumph by the sword. If they should succeed in uniting their hearts and prayers, the Reform would then find such strength in the faith of its children, that Philip's spearmen would no longer be necessary.
Unfortunately this union of minds, that was now to be sought after above all things, was a very difficult task. Luther in 1519 had at first appeared not only to reform, but entirely renovate the doctrine of the Lord's Supper, as the Swiss did somewhat later. "I go to the sacrament of the Lord's Supper," he had said, "and I there receive a sign from God that Christ's righteousness and passion justify me; such is the use of the Sacrament."[188] This discourse, which had gone through several impressions in the cities of Upper Germany, had prepared men's minds for the doctrine of Zwingle. Accordingly Luther, astonished at the reputation he had gained, published this solemn declaration in 1527: "I protest before God and before the whole world that I have never walked with the Sacramentarians."